Monday, August 11, 2014

Meta-Cosmic Ignorance and the Left Wing Ignorantsia

This single aphorism is almost too packed with implications to explicate in the brief time available this morning: "The tacit presuppositions of any science are more important than its teachings" And "Only what a science ignores about itself defines what it says" (Dávila).

This makes one want to grab the nearest Darwinian or Leftist and say to him: "Sounds interesting, but what are the tacit presuppositions underlying your theory, i.e., the worldview that precedes it?"

The typical Darwinian will proceed straight to what are in reality his conclusions, or to the logical entailments to which the theory gives rise, e.g., materialism, or determinism, or reductionism, etc.

But that's not what we asked for. Rather, we want to know his assumptions, his presuppositions about the world (which he pretends he doesn't have). These assumptions 1) are not rooted in the theory, but prior to it; and 2) are highly suspect, to say the least, if the theory is true. In other words, why should we care about what some accidental concatenation of selfish genes assumes about the world? I know I don't.

What I mean to say is that the Darwinian dresses his assumptions as conclusions in order to give them some respectability, but they are assumptions just the same. And you know what they say about that: GITO, or garbage in, tenure out.

Part two of the aphorism suggests that what the Darwinian fundamentalist ignores about himself turns out to define what he says. In other words, a subject of random evolution is constrained by its ignorance, the Darwinian included.

Now, we are all constrained by our ignorance. No shame in that, for we can only be ignorant to the extent that Truth exists. But the Darwinian goes even one step further, and denies his ignorance, thus making him ignorant of his cosmic ignorance, which is thus elevated to his most important implicit teaching: that he is a cosmic ignoramus, or that man's stupidity is absolute.

Which is only true of some men.

Ultimately this goes back to Gödel, liberally interpreted (in other words, one of my acknowledged cosmic presuppositions is that the incompleteness theorems apply to any human thought-system, not just to strictly logical or mathematical ones).

In other words, the theorems are logical because they are true, not vice versa (which really is the whole point, i.e., that humans may securely know truths that are beyond the reach of logic). Therefore, to the extent that Darwinism is consistent, it is incomplete -- radically so in the case of humans. Or, if it is complete, then it must be riddled with inconsistencies. Which it is.

Of course, this poses no problem for the Raccoon, who keeps everything in perspective and avails himself of any truth in order to serve the one Truth. Darwinism is neither consistent nor complete, but that hardly means we can't use it.

So, why this beastly arrogance, this intolerant "all or none" attitude of the Darwinians? Why on this subject do they behave like territorial apes instead of human beings who are uniquely oriented to that which always surpasses them (hence the ground of our humanness)?

Why do they start flinging poo against the walls, just when things are getting interesting? You'd think they were a bunch of animals or something, or that Darwinism is sufficient to explain them.

And if I had had a little more time, I could have tightened up any loose s*it contained above. As it stands, you folks will have sort it out, because I'm late.

13 Comments:

So, why this beastly arrogance, this intolerant "all or none" attitude of the Darwinians? Why on this subject do they behave like territorial apes instead of human beings who are uniquely oriented to that which always surpasses them (hence the ground of our humanness)?

"And yet after watching four hours of its programming and even despite my own lack of religious belief, I find it hard to imagine that even a casual nonbeliever would tune in, let alone someone on the fence about the existence of a higher power. AtheistTV adheres to nasty stereotypes about atheism — smugness, gleeful disregard for others’ beliefs — to a degree that’s close to unwatchable."

Now that's wacky. I always figured one of the benefits of being an atheist is that there is no orthodoxy, no church, and the one tenet - that there is no god - is pretty straightforward. Who needs to proselytize? If Darwinism is the complete truth, then people have evolved to have faith. It really shouldn't matter to one person if another believes in a god, provided that the other isn't trying to murder all nonbelievers.

"The tacit presuppositions of any science are more important than its teachings" And "Only what a science ignores about itself defines what it says"

This brings to mind construction projects - a big tower, for instance. No matter how tall and dazzling it may be, everything proceeds from the foundation. But not only the poured foundation created by human hands - the underlying rock that holds everything up. When people fail to take that into consideration, even the most otherwise carefully-planned project must ultimately come crashing down.

I had a strange experience the other day. I watched the movie "As Good as it Gets" which I hadn't seen in years. I remembered Helen Hunt may have won an Oscar so after the movie I googled her Wiki page and sure enough she won Best Actress. That got me curious about whether Jack Nicholson had won an Oscar so I Wiki'd him and he won for that movie as well as a couple others. But what struck me was that in the little bio section where they list birth, spouse(s), Children, etc., his Religion was listed as None (atheist).

The strange experience was my reaction to that. I felt genuinely saddened, as if he were a a loved one or close friend. I usually don't concern myself with the private lives of celebrities as their political views and other private matters really don't interest me. But for some reason I had that reaction and it bothered me. It's as if I had let my guard down and been drawn into caring about something I shouldn't - about a person I don't even know!

Or maybe I should care? Not just for him, but for all lost people. That's too overwhelming to think about. I'm challenged enough just trying to hold my views in the proper perspective.

Militant atheists have this irrational fear that Christians will force their beliefs onto them, yet that is what they do to believers by attempting to stop freedom of religion.

Now, I could understand their fear if they lived in a Muslim country, however, atheists rarely speak out against Islam, although a few make a token effort occasionally.But their crusade is against Christians who won't lop their heads off.

I reckon they hate Christians the most because they fear us the most.You always hear them warning about a theocracy but fascism is fine with them.Apparently, being told what to do and having their liberties taken away from democrats is hunky dory to the militant atheist.

Obviously, the Truth makes them uncomfortable, and somehow violates their "rights" although they can never point to any evidence that their hysterical paranoia is valid in any way.

Trading logic for true Love is a good deal.Not madness, just courage. Platonic solids do that all the time.Even science just is what gets apprehended. Entropy, phase changes. Sensitive to inital conditions.Depending on what condition the condition is in.Now those scientists are wondering why the physical universe is starting to look like a fourth dimensional shadow of an event horizon, orbiting.I do not understand the sense of falling and rising become a polarized issue.That is like calling evolution the mechanics of the engine in a transport, and not getting in and riding.

"So, why this beastly arrogance, this intolerant "all or none" attitude of the Darwinians? Why on this subject do they behave like territorial apes instead of human beings who are uniquely oriented to that which always surpasses them (hence the ground of our humanness)?"

And why lie and say they want freedom from religion when what they really mean is they want the freedom to impose their scientistic cult on everyone else?

I have never seen an atheist or a leftist make a case that religion has ever been imposed on their liberties.No, they are simply offended that anyone but they have the right to practice their religion.Their cult is settled, why don't people shut up already?

Oh, and the 9/11 cross and crosses commemorating veterans are blasphemy! No wonder real scientists are ashamed of the scientistic wing of the Mob.

I had a lovely time with a bunch of atheist trolls on twitter last Saturday. They appeared as though by magic; they were filtering their feed readers for the word, "atheist."

Through it all, I couldn't get one of them to tell me why they cared. About anything. I posited that caring was a societal construct based on getting a need met, and since I had nothing they needed, why did they care? And yet, they do. Greatly. And still insisted that they knew all there was worth knowing. Surreal. But I had fun!

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Who spirals down the celestial firepole on wings of slack, seizes the wheel of the cosmic bus, and embarks upin a bewilderness adventure of higher nondoodling? Who, haloed be his gnome, loiters on the threshold of the transdimensional doorway, looking for handouts from Petey? Who, with his doppelgägster and testy snideprick, Cousin Dupree, wields the pliers and blowtorch of fine insultainment for the ridicure of assouls? Who is the gentleman loaffeur who yoinks the sword from the stoned philosopher and shoves it in the breadbasket of metaphysical ignorance and tenure? Whose New Testavus for the Restavus blows the locked doors of the empyrean off their rusty old hinges and sheds a beam of intense darkness on the world enigma? Who is the Biggest Fakir of the Vertical Church of God Knows What, channeling the roaring torrent of 〇 into the feeble stream of cyberspace? Who is the masked pandit who lobs the first water balloon out the motel window at the annual Raccoon convention? Who is your nonlocal partner in disorganized crimethink? Shut your mouth! But I'm talkin' about bʘb! Then we can dig it!